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Deicide-Who Killed Them?

Barbara Fara Editor-In-Chief Music Incider Magazine

Deicide means godkiller-more or less. I fell in love with Deicide the first time I laid eyes on them. There was a lot of grace, power, and beauty in that band. -I was fucking depressed when I had heard that the Hoffmans left the band. Rumors flew in bothe directions-the Hoffmans fucked up gigs was one side of the equation. The otherside of the equation was that the Hoffmans couldn't put up with Benton's shit anymore. I had no way to fucking know what was true. Nobody did. All of the sudden Jack Owen from Cannibal Corpse shows up along with some sweet looking kid named Steve. It brought up a lot of questions for me-first of all-what the hell did Cannibal do to Jack Owen? Who is Steve? And where the hell did the Hoffmans go? See, I love Eric Hoffman. Eric is this big, blond, amazing and underrated guitar player. He is sexy as hell too. He could probably be a stand in for one of Zakk Wylde's porn movies. Brain Hoffman is covered with tattoos and piercings and reminds me of the tribe down in Little Five Points. The Hoffmans added raw power to the Deicide machine.

So, cockteased by rumors that the Hoffmans would show up at my Masquerade, I went. The first Deicide show I went to was packed with every body the underground music scene in Atlanta could offer. Benton was witty, sexy, and magnificent on stage. It was worth a shot to see if Benton could go two for two. He could not. I arrived at the show to join a pissed off crowd of forty at the Masquerade heckling the living shit out of Benton-and with good reason. He had put on fifty pounds since the last time I had seen him. Usually-he could interact with the crowd. Deicide fans are used to Glen Benton working the crowd and having him take them to another level. This time he was just pissed off and ineffective. Where the fuck did his charisma go? He had a lazy fucking stage presence that people were just not accustomed to. The weight gain didn't have a fucking thing to do with it. -Jack, Steve, and Steve the drummer tried their fucking best to carry him, but watching Benton die onstage was fucking pathetic. Any of the death growling frontmen in Atlanta could have done a better job that night than Benton, and to think he is a fucking hero to a lot of them. -A pissed off, sweaty frontman who doesn't give a shit about performing for people that buys tickets to his shows is not going to last at all. -Benton has a responsibility to the death metal community to pull his fucking shit together because he is the face that so many people see. Deicide is one of the forefathers of the Florida death metal movement, and Benton is dragging it into the ground with a sack of Twinkies.

My advice Benton? Reformat the band. Get another name and make it fit you. You aren't powerful right now buddy. You are just fucking sad. Beg the Hoffmans to come back and save your fucking ass if you want to stay Deicide, because you are killing a dynasty. And lay off the fucking Twinkies.

About this Article

This article was written by Barbara Fara and is identified as Article #398.